• There are more than 500,000 children and youth in foster care in the U.S.; approximately 20,000 youth “age out” or emancipate from foster care each year.
• 100,000 foster youth live in California.
• In California, 65% of youth leaving foster care do so without a place to live.
• Up to 50% of former foster/probation youth become homeless within the first 18 months of emancipation.
• Twenty seven percent (27%) of the homeless population spent time in foster care.
• Fifty-eight percent (58%) of all young adults accessing federally funded youth shelters in 1997 had previously been in foster care.
• Less than half of former foster youth are employed 2.5-4 years after leaving foster care, and only 38% have maintained employment for at least one year.
• Youth in foster care are 44% less likely to graduate from high school and after emancipation, 40 – 50 percent never complete high school.
• Girls in foster care are six times more likely to give birth before the age of 21 than the general population.
• Sixty percent (60%) of women who emancipate from foster care become parents within 2.5-4 years after exiting care.
• Parents with a history of foster care are almost twice as likely as parents with no such history to see their own children placed in foster care or become homeless.

Former Foster Care Youth - Sacramento Bee